It's Been So Long
by Silence In Winter
Summary: "I'm not Roxas. I'm Hiro." The next life leads to the room of a boy in San Fransokyo who still fights a little dirty. Axel is done waiting for him to remember. (Slight AkuRoku/AkuHiro)


**A/N: Idea that came to me tonight and I had to drabble it out, yo. Nothing serious, just for fun and speculation. :3**

* * *

It's Been So Long

Hiro couldn't breathe. There was something dark inside his chest, something ripping through the flesh as it tried to get out. He turned on his side, upsetting Mochi who mewled in protest. Gripping his sheets, Hiro tossed to the other side. He was damp with sweat and he didn't know why, he just felt hot and sick. Sitting up, Hiro turned on the lamp beside his bed.

"Oh, you're awake." The voice was cool, and excited, coming from a dark cloaked figure sitting in the window. "I've been waiting a long time."

The voice. _That voice._ Hiro wanted to quip at him like he did Tadashi, but fear hushed the power behind his words. "Who—who are you?"

"You don't remember me?!" The figure came into the light with clenched fists and gritted teeth. His hair was unsettlingly red, spiky and long. The cloak he wore was as black as midnight.

"Tada—Shmmm!" Hiro tried to yell for his brother but the man was on him in a blink, wrapping one gloved hand around his lips and the other around his body.

It was loud and hot, pounding in Hiro's ears like a drum and searing the blood in his veins. It hurt. It _hurt._

"Roxas, shh, shh, it's okay, it's just me. It's Axel." Hiro wriggled fiercely against the stranger, yelled into his gloves that his name was not Roxas but it was lost.

"You've gotten pretty weak, y'know. I could probably hold you down with one hand, but where's the fun in that?"

Hiro found a finger and he bit down as hard as he could. "Ah!" Axel let go and Hiro managed to get his feet on the floor for a moment before Axel grabbed the hem of his shirt and dragged him back to the bed. This time as he pinned Hiro, he was not so gentle, jerking the boy's wrists roughly together and twisting them upwards so that his upper body was painfully forced into the bed. Axel tangled his fingers into Hiro's head and pressed his head down to keep him prone.

"You still fight a little dirty, I always liked that about you."

"I told you—"

"Yeah, yeah, you aren't Roxas. But guess what?" Axel leaned in close, the stranger's hot breath against his ear. "I'll see you in the next life, mnn?"

That _thing_ inside of Hiro found purchase on Axel's words. Like the blossom of a black rose, memories erupted from a deep place inside of Hiro. He was chosen, he was losing, there was darkness. The stunning blue eyes of a girl and the cold of an emotionless void, the taste of something cold and sweet called sea salt ice cream.

"Stop—" Hiro gasped, tears springing to his eyes at the chime of a clock tower. "Stop—can't—"

He can't live because he is incomplete, _but to be whole and one_...

Hiro kicked Axel as hard as could in the stomach, sending him off the bed in a heap. Panting, Hiro rolled to his back, sweaty and dazed. His head throbbed from a burning reason that he was already forgetting.

"...Roxas?"

"Go fuck yourself."

"Sounds like you." Axel touches Hiro's chin and this time the boy grabs his wrist and twists it viciously.

" _No._ Leave."

"You didn't remember anything? Anything at all?"

Hiro sits up in the bed. His shirt is hanging off his shoulder and his black hair is messier than ever. There is murder in his dark eyes because now he knows what it is to take a life.

"I'm Hiro Hamada. Not Roxas. Not Sora. I am Hiro."

Axel looks away. Hiro wasn't sure if Axel was about to have another violent outburst and it made him bristle. But then Axel throws his head back and begins to laugh.

"Oh, dear me. Go on, just keep running. I will always be there to bring you back." And then quick as a shadow he was gone.

* * *

When Hiro dragged himself downstairs, Tadashi was helping himself to another cup of coffee. Below he can hear Aunt Cass busy with customers in the cafe.

"You sure slept in." Tadashi remarked. "Were you fighting Mochi last night? It sounded pretty intense."

Yawning, Hiro rubbed the sleep from his eyes. "Hardly. Just some... nightmares I guess."

"Well, just keep it—what the!"

"What? What is it?" Hiro walked to Tadashi, who stood in front of the open freezer. It was filled to the brim with sea salt ice cream bars.

... _i'm just so flattered..._

* * *

 **A/N: Honestly not really expecting much feedback on this one, but awhah these are some of my favorite characters of all time right here so I had to smoosh them together because that's what fanfiction is for, right? Right?  
**


End file.
